Giving color reductionism its due

Abstract Pautz (2003, 2013a) argues that to secure for colors’ reducers structural match with the colors-as-perceived, the reductionist turns colors (inappropriately) into mere relations to numbers, those used to denote quantities of long-, medium-, and short-wavelength light. In this paper, I argue Pautz’s objection stems from an accidental, easily shed, feature of the reducers, namely, their description in terms of long-, medium-, and short-wavelength light. The reducers should instead be given in terms of (relevant) postreceptoral sensitivity functions given directly in terms of wavelength. This results in reducers that should be fully kosher by Pautz’s lights. The upshot, if this works, for debates about perception is externalism is alive and well.